Feeling the heat? Don’t let your CX wilt in the sunshine too

It’s not surprising that the neutral topic of the weather, possibly the most quintessential method for us Brits to start up a conversation, had many of us hot under the collar last week. Hot and humid weather saw temperatures reaching above 37 degrees. Commuters that persevere overcrowded buses and trains daily could not have been prepared for what I can personally only describe as the worst commute I’ve ever had to endure. The soaring temperatures not only led rail operators having to restrict and cancel trains due to the risk of tracks buckling, but the knock-on effect of the disrupted services caused confusion, panic and overcrowding on buses and trains that were still in operation. Flights were grounded or delayed at Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted and Luton airports across the capital while Eurostar rail passengers sweltered through three-and-a-half-hour delays. Sigh!

Delays and cancellations are unfortunately, part and parcel of the travel industry and while measures to prevent the likelihood of disruption are planned for, sometimes it is simply unavoidable. However, whilst man and technology cannot control the forces of nature, travel operators can control whether customers have a good (or poor) experience at a time when they’re under the highest levels of public scrutiny.
How? By keeping customers and staff up to date with real-time information – delivered on the channels most relevant to them.

However, it’s not only the travel industry that might have to deal with the challenges of severe weather. The London Ambulance Service reported having received an influx of calls with St John’s Ambulance and Public Health England issuing advice, urging people to be aware of headaches, dizziness and cramp, which can be signs of heat exhaustion and heat stroke. The RSPCA said it had also seen a spike in calls from members of the public concerned about dogs left in hot cars, conservatories, sheds and caravans. And with staff struggling to commute to work, some businesses are struggling to operate efficiently.

Listening to and reading the news, some companies are better than others when having to inform and respond to enquiries with some headlines reporting heavy criticism for those the lacking in keeping people informed. The convenience of our always ‘on’ online world simply doesn’t’ tolerate businesses that are stuck in archaic siloed processes – not ‘digital first’ – or those that we perceive to be slow in embracing advancing technologies.

As consumers grow more and more comfortable with messaging, businesses must be ‘present’ on their customers’ preferred support channels and respond swiftly, no matter the means customers use to get in touch.

AI applications offer some dramatic benefits that stretch way beyond customer experience. 24/7 support is within reach of those businesses eager to achieve operational efficiency, by utilising channels such as Virtual Agents/Intelligent Chatbots, live chat or dynamic FAQ self-service, especially during unexpected circumstances. These tools not only allow businesses to maintain high levels of service during peak and off-peak times but is a good step towards fulfilling customer needs and expectations.

Investing in AI might sound like a daunting task, but it is imperative in our evermore competitive world where businesses need to win the CX war to remain relevant and profitable.

To explore how AI-driven technology can introduce new value and break fresh ground, you might want to read these digital assets which explain how to consider AI’s impact beyond the novelty.

• The small step towards AI that can deliver quick-win business results

• Sentience AI- Blending Human with Artificial Intelligence

• The explicit link between Digital Customer Service and BUSINESS GROWTH

AI: It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day, it’s a new way of customer support and engagement

With headlines stating that AI will be ‘the death of the contact centre’, it’s understandable that Contact Centre Managers might feel like the world is against them.

AI-driven technology is not new, in fact people been talking about it since the summer conference at Dartmouth College in 1956, where the attendees became leaders of AI research. With predictions of an AI-first world since 1956, why is that AI-powered technology is causing more and more confusion, hype and fear this decade with trending headlines stating that robots will take over our jobs, causing concern about the long-term impact of AI on the employees?

Well firstly, it’s this shorthand referral to AI that is causing a lot of confusion, hype and fear around this subject. Like computing, it’s hard to distinguish between classifications for AI, the broad term, used to describe the ‘smart’ human-like capability within software such as machine learning, natural language processing, robotics and computational intelligence, which all refer to a wide variety of algorithms and methodologies under AI.

So where does AI fit into the contact centre?

Businesses can no longer afford to rely on archaic siloed channels for customer support and experience. As consumers grow more and more comfortable with messaging, AI applications offer the contact centre some dramatic benefits that stretches way beyond customer support. AI can play a vital role in making better business decisions, many of them positively impacting the customer.

Many brands understand that their customers will expect support across multiple digital channels, regardless of business hours and that site search, static FAQs and info@ email options have become archaic. Businesses must be ‘present’ on their customers’ preferred support channels and respond swiftly, no matter the means customers use to get in touch.

Investing in AI might sound like a daunting task, but it is imperative in our evermore competitive world where businesses need to win the CX war to remain relevant and profitable. For AI to introduce new value and break fresh ground, strategists must take an innovative approach to CX and consider its impact beyond its novelty.

Small steps are key to preparing for the ever changing CX landscape. The light in this confusing artificially intelligent world of darkness are that there are ‘modest’ AI-powered solutions that can translate into cost savings, increased productivity and improved customer experience with minimal demands on IT resources.

Commonly known as Natural Language Understanding (NLU) – a machine algorithm to process and analyse large amounts of natural language data to ‘understand’ natural language – it’s easy to underrate the powerful impact this science can have on business processes and the contact centre.

Although human language is extremely complex, full of contextual rules and nuances that we take for granted, the advances in Natural Language Processing today means the complex processing of the NLP system’s back-end is effortlessly encased within a user-friendly interface without requiring users to have technical expertise.

NLU is a supreme AI engine particularly when it’s integrated into services such as conversational Virtual Agents (chatbots), dynamic FAQ self-service, Intelligent Web Form and agent assistance in the contact centre through channels such as Live Chat, can be key to deflecting calls, reducing costs and improving customer satisfaction. Consequently, market movements are already showing strong signs of businesses within a variety of sectors moving towards this type of AI technology to remain applicable and competitive.

How NLU makes sense in the contact centre

NLU can offer a lot more to the modern-day contact centre. As a toe in water into the world of artificial intelligence, when integrated with unstructured data – such as handwritten documents or notes by contact centre agents, text messages, photos and videos – AI-driven NLU can add considerable gains in workplace efficiency.

A contact centre knowledge-base  integrated with AI-driven NLU can automate the processes of searching, modifying, and rating knowledge-articles, which could be any of the above-mentioned examples not only saving time in having to manually find information, but a dramatic increase in contact centre productivity.

It enables new or temporary agents to serve customers almost instantly with reduced training times and access to instant, correct and consistent information over the phone, during a live chat or through email. NLU algorithms often can contextualise information to find mentions of subjects even when the relevant keywords are absent.

Gartner predicted that in 2019, 20 percent of user interactions with smartphones will take place via virtual personal assistants.

The truth is they were not far off. Advances in text analysis and natural language processing has grown the list of queries that can be answered, and tasks resolved without human interaction. And since 2016, the popularity of using NLU in the form of chatbots to drive sales, qualify leads or to provide customer support, have had analysts forecast that conversational commerce will automate up to 85% of customer interactions
by 2020.

Smartphones have changed the way in which people communicate and engage with each other. Messaging apps and social media are driving the exponential growth in the intelligent assistant landscape because it feels intimate and personal, encouraging customer transactions such as buying a product, present targeted promotions and product recommendations based on the customer’s enquiry, profile and history incorporating real-time analytics and business reporting. Bots are unmediated in a way that most digital interface still entirely fails at.

With an intelligent bot handling high volume, frequently asked questions, your contact centre agents can focus on resolving complex customer issues. Additionally, due to working in the most efficient way possible, bots can handle spikes in customer contact to digital platforms, while dramatically decreasing the volume of physical calls which makes it easier to stay on top of demand and to record interactions on a CRM system or for analytics and training. Given its scalability, a bot implementation is a cost-effective opportunity for business improvement. An affordable, intelligent point of contact that can efficiently respond to an unlimited number of queries with relevant information, any day, any time.

Self-serving answers when customers need assistance across desktop, mobile and social channels is not a new concept anymore. This is not news to enterprises either and most will have incorporated – or are looking to integrate – a powerful intelligent FAQ system into their customer service/experience strategy. And although there appears to be an AI-uncertainty among business leaders, small steps need to be taken towards implementing AI to not get left behind.

NLU’s adaptability and usability make it an ideal first AI step for businesses of all kinds, generating quick win efficiencies in the short run, and more importantly preparing them for more complex AI solutions in the future. Are you ready to take the next step towards AI that can deliver quick-win business results?

Synthetix celebrates 18 years of developing cutting-edge AI-driven Customer Engagement tools

The year 2001 was a pivotal year for many tech giants – think Apple introducing OSX and Microsoft releasing Windows XP, but it also saw a new tech start-up, Synthetix, pioneer Virtual Agent technology with SmartAgent, one of the first commercially available enterprise Conversational AI chatbot services. As we celebrate our 18th birthday today, we are reminiscing about our past and our success …

2001 was a tough year for the founders of Synthetix, who with no salary and only a prototype of SmartAgent on old laptops, landed a lucky break, winning the BBC as their very first client. Unlike today, Virtual Agent/chatbot technology was not mainstream in 2001. In fact, it was a very niche idea to use Natural Language Understanding to assist businesses in engaging and supporting their customers online, 24/7.

Still, the idea seems to be catching on, doesn’t it?

Over 18 turbulent, fun, unpredictable years we’ve had the privilege to work with some of the world’s most innovative brands , such as the London 2012 Olympics, Toyota and McDonalds (to name just a few) and helped to reshape the way brands engage with customers digitally. Though our client list is a lot longer than in 2001, we still try to build a personal relationship with each of our clients and those personal connections are one of the many ways we strive to be different.

On behalf of everyone here at Synthetix, we’d like to thank all of our customers and partners for being part of our story. No, really.** ***Thank* you.

Of course, our mission has evolved over the years; Synthetix now sits at the nexus between automated customer self-service and agent-assisted customer service, handling millions of chat and callback interactions as well as the AI-powered self-service technology for which we are well known, but we’re still passionate about delivering brilliant customer experiences, time-after-time.

We also discovered some interesting facts about our birthdate. We would like to wish Mark Zuckerberg, Cate Blanchett and George Lucas a 01001000 01100001 01110000 01110000 01111001 00100000 01000010 01101001 01110010 01110100 01101000 01100100 01100001 01111001 00100000!

And who remembers these nostalgic throwbacks?

•  The pops and whistles as your modem connected to the internet through your landline;
• Trying to get WAP pages to render reliably over flaky GPRS connections;
• Navigating to each meeting using a bunch of faded monochrome map printouts on your lap;

Well, time for some cake and fizz. Here’s to the next exciting 18 years of cutting-edge Conversational AI, Live Chat, Intelligent Web Form , FAQ Search , and Agent Knowledgebase  customer engagement tools.

What were YOU doing in 2001?

Customer experience in the digital age. What do customers expect?

Guest post by Sam Widdowson

It’s no revelation that more and more customers are choosing to shop online. Computers, tablets, and smart-phones have empowered the customer, giving them the flexibility to shop anywhere, any time.

Though the channels they’re using to shop with are changing, their expectations are not. Customers want an efficient, consistent, and enjoyable customer service experience every time they need it. Whether they choose to self-serve with an Intelligent Self-Service tool or a Virtual Agent , or speak to an agent over a Live Chat system, providing them with up-to-date, accurate, consistent information across all channels is now more important than ever as *92% of consumers say they would stop purchasing from a company after three or fewer poor customer service experiences.

Just because customers are now interacting with your brand from behind a screen, the same basic principles still apply as if they were wandering through a shop – if they need an answer to a basic question on a product or service, they don’t want to be waiting around for the next available ‘specialist’, even though that may be what they have to do as there are only finite resources on a shop floor. The Digital Age changes that. Harness the knowledge that flows through your company at the core, and allow your customers to absorb it through the channel of their choosing. Customers expect to be able to self-service  70%+ of their needs through customer portals or mobile applications. Not only does this make your customers happier by giving them the opportunity to get the information they were after efficiently, it will also influence your Customer Service department as the enquiries coming in will be more complex, and agents will be able to allocate the time necessary to give that customer the attention they deserve, keeping those CSAT scores sky-high.

But be careful not to lose that human touch… There’s nothing more frustrating than getting stuck in a loop with a poorly designed ‘chatbot’ that fails to answer even the simplest of questions. Make sure that whoever has commissioned your self-service solution, whether that is an Intelligent Self-Service tool, or a Virtual Agent, factored in escalation routes to speak to a real human, at identified frustration points, through an efficient, convenient channel such as Live Chat or Callback, otherwise those routine enquiries you seem to be deflecting will end up being the customers themselves.

Lastly, personalisation can help deliver exceptional customer experience. Knowledge of the product, company, latest offers, etc, is great for your employees to have; however, if they’ve got no knowledge of the customer’s previous interactions, or frustrations, that have led to that contact, it’s going to be an uphill battle from the outset. Making every interaction personal is what customers want and expect in today’s ultra-competitive market.

Forbes

The ultimate tech stack to improve CSAT and agent efficiency

Guest post by James Robinson

Improvement of CSAT… the holy grail of all CX directors, contact centre managers and CEOs alike. We know that improving the way we deal with customers is key to increasing CSAT (and subsequent profitability), but what types of technology have been proven to deliver these all-important results?

Web Self-Service

First and foremost, make sure you are offering the channels as your customers want. With 50% of customers thinking it’s important to solve product or service issues themselves and 70% expecting a company’s website to include a self-service application , self-service is no longer a ‘nice to have’. A query resolved by the customer themselves, using an intelligent web self-service tool is a query your contact centre agents didn’t have to deal with, significantly increasing their efficiency levels and, by proxy, customer satisfaction.

Conversational AI

Virtual Agents are more than just a flashy UI delivering the same answers as a web self-service tool; they are tools that humanise AI. An intelligently implemented virtual assistant that utilises advanced AI to ‘converse’ with your customers can build trust, something that is vital to attain. Once that trust has been established it is clear that not only will your customer return to that very cost effective channel to communicate with you in the future, but will most likely become a promoter of your company.

Live Chat

The ultimate catchall. As well as the ‘go to’ channel for many customers, an intelligent live-chat solution can be offered to customers who didn’t find what they were looking for first time around, streamlining their journey and improving the chance of achieving one of the most efficiency-driving KPIs around: first contact resolution.

Contact Centre Agent Support

Your contact centre agents are the first (and often, only) interaction with a human that your customers experience so it is vital they have all the information and support they need in order to serve that customer quickly and, more importantly, first time. An AI driven knowledgebase with process simplifying decision trees should do the trick. Encouraging your agents to create content and leave a legacy improves employee engagement and has a positive knock-on effect on CSAT.

Cohesion

OK, not a piece of tech per se but definitely an element of functionality worth mentioning, one that can make the difference between good and stellar results from these technologies. When AI is applied to the journey of a customer in a cohesive way, the experience of that customer improves exponentially. When a solution knows how a customer has interacted with a knowledge resource across all channels, it can react and deliver in a more accurate, human way.

The thought of the cost of implementing all these technologies can be daunting, however, before I finish, I would like to leave with some good news! There is something innate that is already streaming throughout your enterprise, something that is self-generating and infinite, something that is at the very core of all the solutions mentioned in this post. That something is: KNOWLEDGE. Once an enterprise harnesses that innate power it really does transcend the tech to deliver the most significant efficiencies and make a serious impact to a brand’s CSAT.